Encanto, I just love your charm! Disney’s animated blockbuster Encanto is not your typical cookie-cutter fairytale. Though a Disney flick gaining popularity amongst a younger audience is nothing new, what’s special about Encanto is that its music has gained both commercial appreciation and critical commendation as well. Such explosive acclaim is peculiar when taking the soundtrack’s unconventionality into consideration — Encanto’s biggest hit, the chart-topping “We Don’t Talk About Bruno,” is a back-talking piece of earworm with hearty infusions of Broadway, salsa, and good old-fashioned he-said-she-said. So, what led the world to be enchanted with Encanto?

It seems to be Opposite Day for Disney. While traditional Disney heroines have been innately beleaguered with powers — ice magic, magical hair, jealousy-inducing beauty — that alienated them from society, Encanto’s heroine sticks out due to her absence of a power. Antagonists are not exempted from being turned on their heads. A ragged, gangling rodent-lover with a cadaverous complexion and glowing green eyes is — spoiler alert — a kind-hearted man who was simply misunderstood. Such conscious efforts to break pre-existing conventions can be well-observed in the movie’s soundtrack, from subject matter to musical style.

What’s So Special About Encanto?

The music of Encanto, as with any Disney musical, encapsulates and reinvigorates the film’s message: diversity and Latin pride. Encanto is set around early 20th century Colombia, and it is not coy about promulgating its Latin setting. Minute details of the characters’ cadence, costumes, and jokes all relate back to authentic Colombian values. “Dos Oruguitas” is completely Spanish, and “Colombia, Mi Encanto,” the closing track, cheerfully chants “Colombia, te quiero tanto! (Colombia, I love you so much!)”

Latin influence in mainstream Hollywood has been patent in recent years, and Lin Manuel Miranda, the composer and writer of the album, may be the linchpin of the cultural drive assimilating into kiddie content as well.

Throughout the album, contemporary touches are tastefully weaved in with classical Latin elements. “Surface Pressure,” performed by Luisa Madrigal (Jessica Darrow), feels almost like a radio-esque pop hit with its synthetically smooth beats and a beat drop. Though Luisa is dressed in an A-line silhouette dress that showcases her Colombian heritage, her skirt has dumbbells embroidered all over, signifying her physical strength; she is the first Disney heroine to be conspicuously muscular and not of a petite frame, another nod at the theme of diversity.

Diverse character dynamics are explored as well. In “What Else Can I Do?,” Isabela (Diane Guerrero) and Mirabel (Stephanie Beatriz) bicker and annoy each other to no end, but make it clear that they will always have each other’s backs. The manner in which the two sisters are portrayed almost feels like a fun poke at Disney's most famous sister relationship — the dotingly loving bond between Frozen's Elsa and Anna. The track serves as a re-emphasis of the quintessential Disney value of family combined with an imperfect yet realistic sisterly dynamic.

Everybody Talks About Bruno

“We don’t talk about Bruno, no, no, no!” chants the ensemble. Yet, it seems as if all anybody can do is talk about him. “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” has swept the international charts with unprecedented fervor, even supplanting Frozen’s “Let it Go” for the biggest Disney song on the Billboard list. The dethroning is especially intriguing when one considers their substantial polarity.

While most precedented Disney hits were deliberately crafted to be hits with the protagonist belting out soulful ballads or pop sing-alongs, “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” is an odd cocktail of hip-hop, montuno, salsa, and sleekly produced pop where various characters whisper back-talk of the supposed antagonist. As listeners eavesdrop on the family whispering the notoriety of the wicked Bruno, they feel the intrinsic guilty pleasure that comes from partaking in hearsay, as it almost feels as if they are chiming in — a clever storytelling trick on Miranda’s part.

Miranda’s magical Broadway touch shines throughout. The song exudes theatricality with its tongue-in-cheek rhymes and crisp exaggerations. Verse 6’s finale chorus has that meticulously crafted polyphonic mayhem that is his signature, from Hamilton’s “Non-Stop” to In the Heights’s “96,000” — layers of sing-song dialogue where multivarious characters both introduce themselves with a single verse and dramatically reappear in the theatrical climax make “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” the Byzantine mash it is.

With conscious efforts for physical diversity, a Broadway-infused soundtrack, and pollen in the shades of the Colombian flag thrown in the air, Disney steps into a new phase of multiculturality, representation, and on-the-ground subject matters. Yet, Encanto still retains that joyous Disney spark; in all dimensions, it simply is a fun, flamboyant piece of feel-good cinema, complete with killer sing-alongs and a warmhearted rendition of familial love.